Allergen Alert!

I’m getting pretty bad at this... it’s been far too long since I’ve posted on this blog. It’s not that I haven’t been baking, last week I actually baked twice, I’ve just been rather busy. Finishing up my thesis, trying to find a job, who knew growing up took up so much of your time!

Well, I finally got around to baking something I had been dying to try and needed to share it with you. Peanut Butter Bread. Doesn’t it just sound devilishly good? We all know how much I love peanut butter, and I am a sucker for a good sweet bread, so I had to try this. I felt like there was something missing in my life and this bread would fill it nicely. I modified the recipe a bit, to up the ante so to speak. I added chocolate to make a Chocolate Peanut Butter Swirl Bread. Oh yeah!

Here’s the recipe I used, adapted from the blog A Pretty Life in the Suburbs:

Chocolate Swirl Peanut Butter Bread

Makes 9 small loaves and 6 mini muffins, or one big loaf

2 cups flour
1 tbsp baking powder
1/4 cup butter
1/2 cup sugar
1/4 cup brown sugar
1 cup creamy peanut butter
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla
1 cup milk

¼ cup dark chocolate, melted

Directions:

1. Preheat your oven to 350 degrees.
2. In a bowl combine the flour and baking powder.  Set aside.
3. In a mixing bowl beat together the butter and sugars.
4. Then mix the peanut butter, egg and vanilla into the butter/sugar.  Mix well.
5. Add half the flour mix, and combine. Then add half the milk and mix to combine. Repeat with remaining flour and milk.
6. Separate approximately ¼ of the batter into a separate bowl and add the melted chocolate.
7. Pour the batter into a prepared pan (loaf, mini loaf or mini muffin).
8. Bake for 25 minutes for the mini loaves, 15 minutes for the mini muffins or 50-60 minutes for a big loaf. Or bake until a toothpick inserted into the centre comes out clean.

This recipe doesn’t have an extremely strong peanut butter flavour, but it is ridiculously addictive none-the-less (I’ve already inhaled two mini muffins and half of a loaf). If you want to add more of a peanut butter flavour I would suggest perhaps adding a dollop of peanut butter into the batter in the pan and swirling it through. Similarly, the chocolate portion doesn’t have an extremely chocolatey flavour either. You may be able to add more melted chocolate (I would take the chocolate batter and see if it is chocolatey enough for you), or you could try changing up the chocolate type (eg. To milk chocolate perhaps?)

I think after making and tasting this bread, my life is a little more complete. If you are a fan of peanut butter, I would definitely try making this bread, it’s really simple and the results are awesome. I can only imagine how good this bread would be with a bit of jam spread on top...